'What was Jim Wickenden gettin' at when I said he'd set his stack too
near anigh the brook?' Jabez dropped his voice. 'He was in his mind.'

'He ain't never been out of it yet to my knowledge,' Jesse drawled, and
uncorked his tea-bottle.

'But then Jim says: "I ain't goin' to shift my stack a yard," he says.
"The Brook's been good friends to me, and if she be minded," he says,
"to take a snatch at my hay, I ain't settin' out to withstand her."
That's what Jim Wickenden says to me last--last June-end 'twas,'
said Jabez.

'Nor he hasn't shifted his stack, neither,' Jesse replied. 'An' if
there's more rain, the brook she'll shift it for him.'

'No need tell _me_! But I want to know what Jim was gettin' _at_?'

Jabez opened his clasp-knife very deliberately; Jesse as carefully
opened his. They unfolded the newspapers that wrapped their dinners,
coiled away and pocketed the string that bound the packages, and sat
down on the edge of the lodge manger. The rain began to fall again
through the fog, and the brook's voice rose.

* * * * *

'But I always allowed Mary was his lawful child, like,' said Jabez,
after Jesse had spoken for a while.

''Tain't so.... Jim Wickenden's woman she never made nothing. She come